The Great Disorder

Politics, Economics, and Society in the German Inflation, 1914-1924

Gerald D. Feldman

The Great Disorder

Politics, Economics, and Society in the German Inflation, 1914-1924

Gerald D. Feldman

Description

This book presents a comprehensive study of the most famous and spectacular instance of inflation in modern industrial society--that in Germany during and following World War I. A broad, probing narrative, this book studies inflation as a strategy of social pacification and economic reconstruction and as a mechanism for escaping domestic and international indebtedness. The Great Disorder is a study of German society under the tension of inflation and hyperinflation, and it explores the ways in which Germany's hyperinflation and stabilization were linked to the Great Depression and the rise of National Socialism. This wide-ranging study sets German inflation within the broader issues of maintaining economic stability, social peace, and democracy and thus contributes to the general history of the twentieth century and has important implications for existing and emerging market economies facing the temptation or reality of inflation.

The Great Disorder

Politics, Economics, and Society in the German Inflation, 1914-1924

Gerald D. Feldman

Reviews and Awards

Winner of the 1995 DAAD Book Prize of the German Studies Association

"Indispensable reading for anyone interested in the fate of democratic institutions in Weimar Germany and other countries operating in the twentieth-century context of war and economic catastrophe."--American Historical Review

"Mandatory reading for social scientists of all kinds, and not only monetarists and historians dealing with twentieth-century Germany."--Journal of Economic Literature

"Feldman's history of the German inflation is impressive both for the breadth of its vision and the texture of its detail....[The book] will become essential reading for anyone who truly wishes to understand what happened to Germany in the first third of the Twentieth century.--Journal of Military History

"Gerald D. Feldman's history of the great inflation in Germany adds up to one of the most comprehensive investigations of an advanced industrial society....With the realist novelist's eye for illustrative detail and consequential themes, Gerald Feldman has produced a sweeping history of Germany in the age of inflation."--The Historian